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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22681255">Formless Blob</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ByTheFire/pseuds/ByTheFire'>ByTheFire</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF), kickthepj</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Gender Confusion, Introspection, formless blobing it really</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 02:42:48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,090</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22681255</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ByTheFire/pseuds/ByTheFire</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Pj doesn't know how to describe what he is feeling, he doesn't really want to either, it's better to just exist sometimes.</p>
<p>Or a fic inspired by Pj's formless blob tweet when Dan came out</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>PJ Liguori/Sophie Newton</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Formless Blob</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It started off with a shirt he found in the lanes. There’s nothing weird about that it’s just a shirt. That’s at least what Pj tries to tell himself. It’s a girls shirt, and that’s not weird either. Except he isn’t shopping for Sophie or his mum, and they have very different fashion tastes then this shirt he’s holding. It’s just a graphic tee. That’s not weird. Besides if he’s asked any questions he can say he’s getting it for his girlfriend the clerk wouldn’t know any different.</p>
<p>He doesn’t try it on when he gets home. He waits hiding it in the loft in his office. They don’t go up there too often. </p>
<p>He waits till Sophie is back at work when she’ll be gone for awhile teaching palates. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t want her to know yet. She probably wouldn’t care. It would be nice to even hear the nice comment she would make maybe standing on her tiptoes to give him a quick peck. But just the thought will have to do for now. </p>
<p>Pj looks at himself in the mirror and he really likes the shirt. Something about it being a girls shirt feels fitting in a way. No one would realize it’s a girls shirt unless they looked it up or also owned it. Maybe it’s the excitement of a new shirt but he keeps it on. </p>
<p>It totally slipped his mind he was wearing the shirt till he heard the door unlock and Sophie was making her way towards the kitchen where he’s cooking dinner. “Hello, what you cooking it smells good?” She asks giving him a kiss hello. </p>
<p>Sophie never mentioned the shirt. Pj doesn’t know whether or not to be grateful for that or not. </p>
<p>~</p>
<p>He visits London and stops by Dan and Phil’s flat instead of taking the train home at night. Dan has some glitter nail polish on and it’s all Pj has been paying attention to as they pull out some board games to play. </p>
<p>At some point the conversation shifted to Dan’s nails. He doesn’t know how they got here but Dan is painting one of his nails with a light yellow nail polish. It was either that or black. Black seems like it would be harder to clean off. </p>
<p>“It’s not the cleanest but just be grateful Phil didn’t do it or your hand would have polish on it too.” Dan jokes. </p>
<p>Phil is quick to defend himself with a “hey I didn’t do that badly.”</p>
<p>“You sure you only want one nail?” Dan asks in a voice that offers up more understanding than Pj was expecting. </p>
<p>“Y-yeah. Maybe another day I’ll paint more.” He offers. </p>
<p>Phil gives a big smile back and for some reason Pj finds himself trying not to cry.</p>
<p>~</p>
<p>The next time he experiments with nail polish Sophie went on a holiday with some friends. Something about a girls trip, she likes to have a couple throughout the year. </p>
<p>But a week home alone gives him the chance to experiment. He looks at Sophie’s nail polishes before picking out a bright red one. He only paints one nail but it’s a lot more noticeable than the yellow he wore at Dan and Phil’s home. </p>
<p>Chris is coming over that day something flashes through Pj’s mind that he should remove the nail polish but he pushes that aside. Chris isn’t going to judge and if he does he can say he was testing it for Sophie at the store. Yeah exactly. Escape routes just in case. </p>
<p>Chris doesn’t even notice for the first few hours they are hanging out. By time he actually notices Chris is laughing over how he didn’t notice Pj only had one nail painted. By the end of the night both boys have one hand painted. It’s less scary when Pj is doing it with a friend. </p>
<p>~</p>
<p>When Pj is going to pick Sophie up at the train station he realizes he didn’t remove the nail polish. He feels as if bubbles are going on to explode out of his stomach. Any thread of logic he had was lost as he tries to pick off the polish, even trying to scrape it off with his teeth anything so he could do to get it off. </p>
<p>When he looks up he sees Sophie is walking towards the car. Maybe if he acts like nothing is there he can hide his hand away till he can remove the remaining nail polish. He almost wishes he thought of it sooner as he wouldn’t have to see the now cracked and flaking polish. </p>
<p>It didn’t take that long for Sophie to notice. Talking with your hands today is a trait he almost wishes he didn’t pick up in the moment. He freezes as Sophie grabs his hand while they are at a stop light “what did you do to your nails?”</p>
<p>Pj pulls his hand back and almost regrets it when he sees the hurt look on his partner's face. Almost. He’s telling himself her tone was meant to be more curious than hurtful. “I- umm I painted my nails. So did Chris it was just a thing” he adds on at the end for safe measure. </p>
<p>Sophie doesn’t say anything till the car starts moving again. “You know it’s ok if you like to wear nail polish.”</p>
<p>“Yeah. Yeah of course I do.” He said but not really knowing who he was trying to convince.</p>
<p>~</p>
<p>Sophie was shaking a new bottle of blue nail polish. She bought it the next day after their conversation in the car. </p>
<p>“Just one hand.” He tells her biting at the inside of his cheek. </p>
<p>“Just one hand?” She is confused. He can't blame her because so is he. He doesn’t know why he’s been feeling a stronger pull towards more feminie things. He just does.</p>
<p>“Yeah one hand makes it less real.” He doesn’t look away from his nails as Sophie carefully paints them. </p>
<p>“You know you’re allowed to use mine too. But I thought it would feel better if you had some of your own.” She says softly. She knows this is a rough subject and Pj’s grateful he’s found someone who doesn’t demand answers and can flow with him. </p>
<p>He looks over at the other colorful polishes that Sophie called “pj colors' which just happened to be a lot of funky bright matte polishes. But it makes him have the biggest smile nonetheless.</p>
<p>~</p>
<p>Wearing nail polish isn’t uncommon after that. He even felt confident enough to start out with some Instagram stories. </p>
<p>Thankfully all taken well. He didn’t see an ounce of hate which he was surprised by for some reason. Pj knows his community is small so the chances of people being negative is low, but he was still shocked to see nothing but support. Some more than support as there is even a little bit of fan art.</p>
<p>~</p>
<p>Pj and Sophie are back in London visiting Dan and Phil. They haven’t hung out in ages and decided to also take the opportunity to film some videos. </p>
<p>Sophie and Phil have gone off on their own tangent and Pj has taken the time to sit back and listen. </p>
<p>At least till Dan brings up the nail polish he took off earlier before they filmed. “So the polish hasn’t made it’s YouTube debut?”</p>
<p>“Ahh not yet. I don’t know if I could answer questions about it you know.” It’s said more as a statement than a question. </p>
<p>“You don’t have to answer questions you know. You don’t have to explain it you’re just a person wearing nail polish everyone does that.” Dan says as if the answer is that simple. Pj wishes it was that simple. </p>
<p>“I don’t even think I have answers for myself much less others. I don’t know how Sophie doesn’t get frustrated with me. I just don’t have the right words. Even if I did I feel like it would change every month.”</p>
<p>“Like something fluid? Or more of a formless blob?” </p>
<p>“A what?” Pj asks laughing because it sounds funny. The weight on his chest feels lighter with something so... well Pj. </p>
<p>“You know formless blob. Just you. Freedom without labels. Not needing to worry if little details change or having to explain more than you like. Something open enough for people to know there’s something but doesn’t have to be that deep.” Dan explains it like some wonderland. </p>
<p>“That might be the closest I’ll ever get.” he says. “It feels safe. It feels like something that would be a Pj thing”</p>
<p>Dan smiles back “it does. I feel like you already have some blob like characters.”</p>
<p>“You could even write some in the future I’m sure people would love it.” Phil speaks up. Apparently at some point they started listening to their conversation. “You can safely explore and everyone feels seen.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah I could do that.”</p>
<p>~</p>
<p>The nail polish does make a youtube debut soon. He thought he might get some people upset about the nail polish because it’s bound to happen, but the comments on the nail polish isn’t what he expected. Everyone is asking why he only painted one hand. Pj can only laugh, his shoulders feel lighter. He can definitely deal with people asking why he doesn’t paint both hands. </p>
<p>~</p>
<p>Pj was going to do another fashion video. The videos were fun to make, he got to laugh around with Sophie. She had fun picking out outfits that were ridiculous and things Pj would never wear. Most of the clothes were returned or donated to charity shops, maybe they kept one or two of the clothing items. </p>
<p>Sophie tossed another clothing item Pj’s way, “I hope you like this one actually.” Pj looked down at the all black piece of fabric.</p>
<p>“Oh no that doesn’t sound promising.” Pj laughs going behind the couch pulling off the horrible ripped jeans he just tried on. They were barely jeans, more of just jean outline. Once he started trying on what Sophie just gave him he realized it was a long skirt. </p>
<p>“Oh!” He felt his heart beat a little faster but not like it did the first time he got that shirt from the lanes. No this felt right. The skirt had some little flappy bits on the front that dipped down a little below his knees.</p>
<p>“Show me I want to see too.” Sophie says standing on her tiptoes.</p>
<p>Pj walks back around the couch “does it look ok?”</p>
<p>“Does it look ok, dude you look good!” She says smiling. </p>
<p>He smiles wider “Yeah?” Pj lets his hands run over the fabric more. He sways and twists a little watching how the fabric flows around him.</p>
<p>“You look hot.” Sophie lowers the camera a little “I thought you’d like it plus I think it would go good with the cloak you have, you could totally wear it to a primere if you wanted, or you know just around here.”</p>
<p>“Maybe around here, at least now.”</p>
<p>He almost wants to ask if they can stop filming he doesn’t really want to take the skirt off. Pj didn’t though but he definitely knew this was not making the video.</p>
<p>~</p>
<p> </p>
<p>June was here and Pj was loving all the posts from his friends and random ones he saw on his timeline celebrating. He felt good seeing how many posts there were about not needing to define yourself to a label. That you can identify with as many labels as you please or none at all.</p>
<p>It was fun to watch movies with friends and call guys hot. He loved wearing nail polish. He enjoyed wearing some more feminine clothing casually around the house. He didn’t need any words to define how he felt because he just was Pj. He was Pj with his partner who was there to laugh over how he called his friends hot knowing at the end of the night she was his. To help him know it’s safe to push the boundaries.</p>
<p>Maybe it was ok to say something, just a little nod to anyone who would catch it. As his friends came out that month he shared his support along with his gratitude of how they have helped him:</p>
<p>New Tweet From kickthepj: dan has made an incredible video that you should definitely watch. I feel very lucky to be his friend. also thank you for introducing me to the term ”formless blob", that resonated with me way more than I expected.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I've wanted to publish this fic for awhile. Sitting back as a viewer and watching Pj grow into who he is makes me proud. I really wanted to be careful writing this cause I don't want to overstep or seem like I'm digging into things. But it's fiction so ya know take it as that.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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